A new federal program is taking aim at the environmental impacts of commercial refrigeration. And a couple of grocery chains with local stores have volunteered to help.

Hannaford Brothers Co. and Whole Foods Market are two of 10 charter members of a new federal initiative called the GreenChill Advanced Refrigeration Partnership. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency unveiled the program today.

The new partnership is a voluntary program to develop technologies and practices that protect the stratospheric ozone layer and the earth’s climate from chemicals used in the refrigerators. The partners also will explore ways to improve energy efficiency to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

The EPA estimates that reducing refrigerant emissions could have benefits equivalent to taking 800,000 automobiles off the road every year. It also estimates that improvements could save the industry more than $12 million a year.

The Killington ski resort in Vermont is taking a more simple – and radical – approach with its refrigerators.

Killington spent $50,000 last summer to retrofit 10 of the resort’s walk in refrigerators with equipment that simply uses nature’s ultimate refrigerant – winter – to chill the coolers. The Freeaire Refrigeration System is expected to save the resort more than 86,000 kilowatt hours of electricity and eliminate an estimated 58 tons of carbon dioxide emissions a year.

Unfortunately, the system isn’t for residential refrigerators. Here’s an interesting discussion of that idea.

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